Ducklings
by bluethursday
Summary: Bruce, Damian, Dick and Jason are now toddlers for one year and one day. Tim has decided to care for them while the villains decide that if there was ever a time to hit on Tim, now would be it.


Summary: Bruce, Damian, Dick and Jason are now toddlers for one year and one day. Tim has decided to care for them while the villains decide that if there was ever a time to hit on Tim, now would be it.

Disclaimer: I own nothing

**Ducklings**

The change had been swift, unexpected and unwanted but what had come to pass afterwards could not be alleviated.

It could only pass as all things would. With time.

A year and a day was the mark given and although a cure had been searched for, bartered for and in the end pleaded for none could be found.

Four toddlers remained in Wayne Manor, gazing up at Tim with jewel toned eyes. Three differing shades of blue and one shade of green.

Bruce, Dick, Damian and Jason.

Alfred watched from the side, his face a solemn mask of determination.

"Mr. Pennyworth." Tim began, " I believe that the Wayne's will be having a long family vacation. I will take care of the company from home, Mr. Fox will do the rest."

Alfred dependable as always replied, "Of course Master Timothy, and what of your nighttime excursions?"

Tim looked at the four small faces, each of them smiling up at him. Dicks chubby hands griping his pant leg.

"I believe, Mr. Pennyworth, that the Justice League will have to care for Gotham. The public will be informed that Batman has gone off planet. Bruce Wayne will be in rehab, again."

Alfred nodded and gazed at Tim as he lifted Dick, rocking him up and down, making soothing noises under his breath. The others soon swarmed, small limbs grabbing the figure in front of them wherever small hands could reach.

Tim kneeled, pulling them into his arms as best he could. His limbs were not long enough nor large enough to encompass them, but they would do.

"Alfred," Tim looks over his shoulder at the older man, "Grandfather." He begins again. "What will I do?"

What will I do when my elders have become younger than me. When the youngest has regressed farther still. What, Grandfather, will I do?

Alfred notes the way the children lean into Tim.

"You will do as you do now, Master Timothy."

While the young man struggles to comprehend the grandfather knows. His grandchild, third of the set will be just fine.

…

**Beach**

"Hello Timothy, its so nice to see you."

Tim looks at Slade, gleaming muscles displayed proudly. He is not impressed. This is the third time someone has interrupted their family vacation. Out of the corner of his eye he can see his ducklings building a sandcastle. This does not bode well for Slade.

They had thrown mud at Ra's the last time he had…visited.

"Leave Slade, this is a family vacation."

Alfred sits dutifully behind Tim, the picture of a kindly grandfather.

"Oh I'm sure you can make room for one more, can't you?" Slade leers.

He thinks that the boys may be building a functional sand canon, not a sandcastle as he had originally thought. If they succeed he will be very impressed.

"Alfred. Could you please?" Tim asks. The older gentlemen is well aware of his role. Pulling a shotgun from between the stack of towels, the butler cocks the weapon and points the nozzle at Slade.

"Head or groin sir?"

This has become routine for their small family. The ducklings grin. Damian is particularly savage. He always hopes for blood. Alfred can recall the time the small toddler threw a homemade shiv at Lex Luthor. He had fashioned it from a toothbrush. Tim had been an odd mixture of proud and deeply concerned.

Tim hums in thought before answering, "Groin, Alfred, if you will."

Slade raises his hands in surrender and backs away. This will not be the last time they are approached, by Slade or others. Alfred can see a group of collage boys playing volleyball in the distance.

Tim's large blue and white striped shirt is slipping off one shoulder, his swim trunks distressingly short.

No, this will not be the last time they will be approached.

"Boys." Tim calls out.

Four little heads turn to face him. "Come here, I need to re-apply the sunblock."

Obediently they move underneath the large red umbrella to sit on the larger pale yellow blanket Tim has been laying under for the better part of the morning.

Uncapping the white substance Tim begins with Jason and Bruce, both who were more prone to sunburns before moving on to Damian and Dick who in Tim's opinion probably wouldn't burn at all even without the cream. He applies it none the less, dabbing a little bit extra on their noses.

Amid the cuddles and kisses, the reassurances that no Tim would not walk off with the bad man, the third Robin believes for the first time, that he may be able to do this.

…

**Lex**

Bruce was carefully dissecting his french toast, as Damian was doing to his crepes.

Dick and Jason were getting more syrup on their faces then they were in their mouthes from the pancakes they were devouring. Dipping the handkerchief Alfred had so kindly provided in the glass of water by his side, Tim set himself to cleaning sticky faces and hands and elbows in Jason's case.

It was a typical breakfast until Lex Luthor walked into the diner, dressed in a full suit, his body guards waiting outside.

Without looking at the taller man Tim began to speak. "I sincerely hope that you had no intention of speaking to me Mr. Luthor."

Jason squirted maple syrup in the businessman's direction before he could speak. The blue tie Lex wore would never be the same again. Dick grinned, Damian gripped his butter knife and contemplated stabbing the bald man in the eye while Bruce patted Jason on the shoulder in congratulations.

Tim smiled. He had such wonderful children.

Wiping at the sticky substance disgustingly Lex began to speak, "They are absolutely charming, have you picked out a boarding school yet or should I?"

Tim stiffened, "Is there a point to your visit?"

Lex sighed, "Timothy, Timothy, Timothy… you see, I have this building surrounded. I believe that I will be joining you for breakfast. The brats can wait outside."

Alfred passed Tim the small black tablet that the younger man had personally designed. Tim carefully found the correct file and presented it to Lex.

"This, Mr. Luthor is what happens if you do that. I have an unspecified group of people ready to burn your company to the ground, dismantle everything you have ever built and assimilate it into Wayne Corp."

Lex raises an eyebrow as he skims the file. "You do realize some of this is illegal."

Tim continues wiping syrup from Jason's elbows. "I don't have to concern myself with legalities Mr. Luthor, all I have to do is win. Get out, leave, take your men with you and do not come back."

Leaving the black tablet on the table Lex exits the dinner.

Damian manages to throw the knife at the door just as Lex leaves.

**Daycare**

Tim huffs in disgust. "Honestly Alfred, why is it so hard for them to take care of four boys? They do these things all the time and they lost my children for two hours. They could have been killed! Incompetent, lazy idiots, all of them."

Alfred pointedly does not mention that the four boys in question include two former Batmen, and two former Robins.

…

", I regret to inform you that we will be unable to take care of your children in the future." The daycare worker nervously plays with the hem of her work apron as she speaks.

Tim sneers, "Considering you lost my children for two hours, I would not be likely to use your services again regardless."

The boys are lined up like angels, waiting patiently to go home. The worker can not believe her eyes, these are not the demon spawn who had terrorized the classroom. The hell beasts who had stagged a revolt, binding one of the other workers with tape and skip rope before barricading the room with building blocks and escaping through the window.

"Mr. Wayne, Damian bites, Dick insists that he was raised in a circus and as such he does not need to wear pants, Jason is a violent little bully and Bruce is like a miniature dictator."

Tim sniffed imperiously. "Children bite, Jason is exuberant, Bruce is very smart for his age and Dick was in fact raised in a circus. On that note what do pants honestly have to with anything? He was covering his genitals with his underwear."

The worker adjusted her glasses, "Yes, he-he did, until he defecated in the flower pot."

Tim waves his hand, "Fertilizer. Come alone ducklings, we have places to be. I am never going to leave you in this horrible place again."

One by one they followed him out of the room. Damian growled, "They tried to make us sit in a circle, and the fat woman spoke to us as though we were mentally damaged. "

Bruce nodded, "It was most unsatisfactory. I did not enjoy it when she put her face so close to mine and kept insisting that the blocks were fun to play with. I know the alphabet."

Jason roared, but he was Jason so they all took it in stride.

Dick proudly walked to the car with his pants on his head, his batman underwear proudly displayed, running to the car he began to scream, "I am the night."

"Slow down." Tim called out and Dick instantly shuffled back into line.

**Ducklings: Justice**

He had left them in the living room of the JLA headquarters, modified to be child friendly and returned to the sight of his four charges sitting innocently on the floor, playing cards. This would never end well.

"They're not dead are they." Tim asked, mostly because he was aware that it was a possibility. His children were prone to escaping all caretakers other than Tim and Alfred.

_They _were Clark, Diana, Ollie and Arthur, or in other words Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Arrow and Aquaman. Martian Manhunter was, ironically, on the same inter-planetary mission the public assumed Batman to be participating in.

The heroes had all insisted with varying degrees of certainty that they could watch a few children while Tim did the computer maintenance. They had assured Tim that four toddlers could easily be handled by the people who saved the world on a regular basis.

Apparently they had lied.

Bruce spoke for all his companions as he answered, "No."

Tim yawned. Everything was fine then. If they were alive it wasn't really a concern. He couldn't help but wonder if the boys had their nap. Maybe he would lay down with them for a while. He was, after all, tired.

…

Finding the heroes was a bit of a problem. The boys had done a good job at covering their tracks.

Locked in one of the rooms designed specifically to detain him Superman stared the wall. They had told him that they wanted to play hide and seek. They told all of them that they wanted to play what the heroes had assumed was a children's game. In reality it was a war tactic designed to divide the ranks and bring them to the areas best suited to trap them.

Clark could not believe that he had been captured by four toddlers. It eased the pain to know who the toddlers were but still…toddlers.

When Tim finds him, Clark just mutters things about little monster children who did not know how to play hide and seek or maybe knew how to play hide and seek far too well.

…

Ollie they find second. He had spent the last five hours in a garbage disposal unit, locked inside amidst soiled clothing too ruined to re-use and the usual waste one foinds in the garbage. Odds and ends that were no longer purposeful.

The children had never liked Green Arrow.

It came through in their choice of holding space. Ollie had been amused at the skill they displayed, taking his time spent in a trash can with surprising grace.

Shrugging he accepts a helping hand, "I called Dick slugger. I'm pretty sure they didn't like that." Tim can tell by his shit eating grin that Ollie had antagonized them on purpose.

…

The find Wonder Woman and Aquaman last.

They find Diana in a cell meant for prisoners with Arthur as her companion. Both of them are spitting mad, the same look of disapproval etched onto their faces.

Diana was the first to speak, "You need to teach them proper manners."

Tim stared at the amazon princess dispassionately, "They know their manners. You need to take better care of children."

Bruce and Damian never failed to say please and thank you, nor did they fail to inquire about Tim's well being. Jason and Dick were reminded by the example the two set.

The princess spluttered, "Children? Children! Those…those…things, are more like animals than children. What have you been teaching them?"

Tim glared at Diana. Where was the almighty Wonder Woman when his siblings and father de-aged? Who behaved as though Bruce had died because he was unable to to the things he once could. He was suddenly small and vulnerable but Batman all the same an yet it was as though he no longer existed.

They had helped try to find a cure, to fix what had gone wrong but none of them had spent their days getting Damian to eat, or putting Dick and Jason to bed, or making Bruce smile. Those were things reserved for family and she did not have the right to question how his family was taken care of.

"I got them." Tim began, "In the condition they are currently in."

And he had. Remains of their older selves shining through in their utter savagery and intelligence. Proof of who they would one day be, who they once were.

He paused to look over his shoulder at his boys, standing at attention, ready to leave.

"I took care of them." He continued, "I_ take_ care of them. Your job was to watch them for five hours and make sure they were safe while_ I_ did _you_ a favor."

The boys can feel a shift in the air, in the mood of their caretaker. They have seen him like this before. Quietly they flank him, keeping the large, annoying people far away as possible.

"You had one job." Tim gestured to the toddlers, "They are children. They are themselves as they were as children and you failed to take care of them. You were outsmarted, outgunned and outmaneuvered by a group of five year olds and that _hurts_, but they are children. You are not."

With that Tim scooped Dick up, holding his little circus boy close to his person. The hug was more for him than it was for the first Robin and he understood that, cooing at Tim, chattering aimlessly to distract him from well meaning but irritated amazons.

Tim knew they were hard to deal with, difficult, impossible and unpredictable, the same as their larger versions.

He knows that he has done exceptionally well talking care of them but that does not change the fact that he is seventeen and he has gone from failing to take care of himself to having the care of four small, perfect, human beings entrusted to him.

It is as though everyone knows that he is mature and responsible and that he always gets the job done but fails to realize that he is only seventeen and what is he to do with four souls who look to him to provide them the necessary things?

He is the temporary parent of his father, his brothers and all anyone can notice is that the children they have become are viciously intelligent, ruthless and brutal.

Tim wonders what they thought Bruce was before, if not _ruthless_, what Damian was if not _vicious_, what Jason was if not _brutal_, and what Dick was if not _intelligent_.

It is as though they expect the children they were to be the children they knew. To be like the children that belonged to the civilian families they saved and that was so incredibly stupid.

Here beside him stands a circus child, and what child is honestly raised in a circus? A street rat and the heirs to two vastly different kingdom, all of who will grow to be heroes without powers and the Justice League expects them to be sweet childish beings?

Dick pats his cheeks with gentle hands. "Don't be sad. We don't like it when you're sad."

And Tim laughs, peppering the tiny face in front of him with kisses. "I'm not baby, I'm just wondering."

Damian tugs lightly at Tim's pant leg, prompting him to look down. "Don't wonder too far." His eyes are solemn.

Tim will not take them back to the headquarters until they are old enough to have their own access codes. This visit has done no good them, not when they are faced with the people who can not handle who they are now, in the face of who they were.

**Ducklings:Fights**

**Clark**

Damian grinned at Bruce, both of them inching towards the reclining figure. Even Superman had to sleep sometime.

They had approximately 12 seconds to make this work, past that, Clark would wake up but the end results would be well worth the consequences.

Jason and Dick watched the entrances, Jason at the window, Dick by the door. Both of them invested in their respective roles.

Superdouche had watched their caretaker far too long, mincing around the house like he owned the place and everything in it. None of them found his assumed claim to be as innocent as Tim believed it to be. No one needed to spend that much time around the manor, and more importantly around Tim.

No one.

Even sneaky suitors who were really aliens from other planets as opposed to usual collection of villains that gathered around Tim like sharks circling smaller prey.

Most of the time, Bruce and Damian had a cute, if violent, sibling rivalry that the other two took no part in.

Dick, because he could care less and Jason because he would get distracted by other things far too easily.

This, however, was war and the blue and red bastard was invading their territory and trying to steal their caretaker. A truce was formed in the hopes of removing the man from their house, or, if not that, annoying the unholy hell out of him.

Bruce raised three fingers and started lowering them one by one.

A countdown.

Damian re-adjusted his grip on the bucket containing the pink dye. It had taken them two hours to find a perfect mixture that would remain on any tested surface for seventy-two hours.

One finger down, two more to go.

Jason took a bite out of his bread roll, Dick's shoulders shook with silent laughter.

Last finger down.

The dye made contact and the toddlers ran behind Tim who had come in to check on them.

One ruined couch and one apology so false it set Clark on edge, they watched a pink Superman fly home to Kansas.

The apology went something like this.

Damian began with a charming, ''I'm sorry you were on the couch at the time of our experiment, if you watched where you slept more often things like this wouldn't happen. Sometimes I forget that you were raised in a barn but when you take actions like-''

''Damian.'' Tim interrupted trying not the laugh.

Damian sighed, ''I'm sorry.''

Clark could practically see the captions above the small boys head detailing just how truly sorry he was, which was not at all, as well as what he would do to the larger man if he ever got him alone in a room with a pile of kryptonite.

Bruce went next, the picture of decorum in his miniature suit, landing the finishing blow to the apology Damian had begun.

''I apologize, Mr. Kent, but really, what sort of reprobate are you that took your nap in the dining room.'' Brushing a piece of lint off his shoulder Batman appeared deadpan, or at least Batman the child size version, appeared deadpan.

Jason and Dick, had nothing to say about the incident. Tim suspected they never would. Their grins were too bright for them to even begin faking an apology.

Tim looked down at the four, ''Was that really necessary?'' He asked event though he knew the answer would be-''

''Yes.''

**Favorites**

Damian growled, tugging Tim's hand in a bid for attention. Today, they would settle this once and for all.

Bruce, not to be outdone grabbed Tim's other hand while Jason and Dick grabbed a leg each. Four small faces looked up at him seriously.

Tim had assumed it was nothing serious so it came as a sudden shock when Dick blurted out, ''Who do you like best?'' His grip on Tim's right leg tightened, his entire body curling around the limb like a very large koala.

Tim's eyes widened, ''I don't like you. I love you, all of you and I love you equally but differently.''

Bruce's eyes narrowed into slits, ''How so.''

''Well.'' Tim began, ''You, are my little dictator and Damian is my little monster.''

Pausing to ruffle Dick's hair, ever so gently, Tim continued, ''Dick is my little circus boy.''

He grasped Jason by one leg pulling him upside down in front of his person, arm raised high to align the toddlers face to his. One kiss to the nose sent Jason into a fit of giggles.

''Jason is my little wild child. You are all, however, my babies.''

Setting Jay down on the floor, Tim was pulled onto the carpet by his charges, each of them claiming a limb and curling around him like small, determined leeches, forcing him into place.

A blush had risen on each of their tiny faces. The answer had satisfied them.

Tim watched them fondly before drifting off to sleep. Sometimes he wished they would just tell him when they wanted him to join in on nap time as opposed to barrelling him down and laying to siege to his body. It was as though he was the only thing they could sleep on and if they did not capture him, he would magically run away.

**Chicken Pox**

Spooning ice cream into Jason's mouth Tim, sighed. Chicken pox. All of them had chicken pox.

All of them were miserable and itchy, and tired and Tim was terrified that they would start dying even though his logical mind proclaimed that they would be better soon, that the worst was over and that his babies would be just fine.

That was the scene Ra's walked into, grandly opening the door his gesture useless in the face of Tim's absolute rage.

He was not prepared to deal with this today.

''Ah, my darling Timothy, I see your charges have fallen ill, I, of course, have brought the finest doctors for them so that we may spent our time together.''

Dick sneezed, which was strange because one did not sneeze when one had the chicken pox but Tim did not question it, distracted by the tall crazy man in front of him.

Slamming the ice cream down on the counter Tim rose.

''Get out. Get out now or I swear to all that is holy I will rip out your entrails and hang you by them.''

Ra's grinned, pleased to incite such passion from his Timothy, before an elder gentleman came from behind and struck him in crotch with what appeared to be a metal serving platter.

His ninjas came from the shadows, but they were too late to prevent the blow from occurring. Tim smiled, lips tight.

The third robin raised his foot and lightly kicked the man lying on the floor.

''Leave Ra's'' Tim repeated. ''I don't have time for this and Superman is in the vicinity. I call out and he comes to get us, faster than you or any of your men could shoot a gun.''

Ra's groaned, ''Must you be so stubborn Timothy?''

Tim nodded, ''Yes.''

Turning to Alfred, who had brought up more ice cream for the boys he ignored the demon's head to speak with the butler. ''Thank you Alfred. That was much appreciated.''

Alfred puttered towards the boys, all of them huddled together on a single bed, sharing their misery.

''Not a problem Master Tim. I have filled the large bath with oatmeal, will you be joining the young masters?''

A chorus of yeses rang out from the covers.

''I believe so,'' Tim replied, smiling wryly. He would remind them of this in a year when they were old enough to be humiliated.

By the time they had left their bath, Ra's was nowhere to be seen.


End file.
